It has been nearly four years since Bobby Brewer swam the 100-meter backstroke at the World University Games. But no matter how many times he talks about that race, there's still pain and frustration in his eyes. Brewer, who will compete in the Spring Nationals Sunday through Thursday in Nassau, N.Y., was ranked sixth in the world at the time and a prime candidate for the 1996 Olympic team. "I had a good prelim that morning," Brewer, now 25, recalled.

It was Paul Carter's first competition in 13 years and it had been 23 years since he was a member of Tennessee's first national championship swim team. But on Saturday at the Speedo Grand Challenge at Heritage Park, the 43-year-old swimmer showed he still has what it takes to compete with some of the best.

Matt Cornue, a swimmer for Villa Park High, will attend Harvard, according to David Salo, who coaches the Irvine Novaquatics, Cornue's club. Cornue won the 1993 Southern Section Division I title in the 100 freestyle. Harvard, which doesn't offer athletic scholarships, won the 1994 Ivy League men's swimming title.

Six Olympic medalists will compete at the Speedo Grand Challenge Swim Invitational beginning today at Heritage Aquatics Park in Irvine. Jason Lezak, Aaron Peirsol, Anthony Ervin, Misty Hyman, Scott Tucker and Staciana Stitts are among those competing in the three-day event, hosted by the Irvine Novaquatics. Lezak and Ervin will highlight Day 1 in the 50-meter freestyle. Lezak, who swims for the Novaquatics, has the fastest seed time in the event, 22.34 seconds.

Broken records were the rule on the second day of the Speedo International Grand Challenge Swimming Invitational Saturday at the Heritage Park Aquatic Complex. Hope Gittings of Bolles-Shark Swim Club in Florida started the trend, setting the first of five meet records in the first event, winning the the 100-meter backstroke in 1 minute 6.18 seconds. Gittings broke Jessica Tong's mark of 1:06.73 set in 1995.

Top officials at the elite Irvine Novaquatics swim club have experienced nothing but bureaucratic headaches since answering an advertisement offering the use of the indoor pool at the former El Toro Marine Corps Air Station. Tony Gauthier, vice president of the club, said county representatives led the swim club to believe it could be using the pool by July 1999. But they have yet to get wet there. If U.S.

Chad Hundeby of Irvine won the first national championship of his career Tuesday by winning the 1,000-yard freestyle in 9 minutes 1.53 seconds at the U.S. Swimming Short Course National Championships. Hundeby, who swims for the Irvine Novaquatics and was The Times' Orange County swimmer of the year in 1988 as a senior at Woodbridge High, proved that he belonged among the nation's elite as he held off Rob Darcynkiewicz of Chappaqua, N.Y. Darcynkiewicz took second in 9:03.57.

Six Olympic medalists will compete at the Speedo Grand Challenge Swim Invitational beginning today at Heritage Aquatics Park in Irvine. Jason Lezak, Aaron Peirsol, Anthony Ervin, Misty Hyman, Scott Tucker and Staciana Stitts are among those competing in the three-day event, hosted by the Irvine Novaquatics. Lezak and Ervin will highlight Day 1 in the 50-meter freestyle. Lezak, who swims for the Novaquatics, has the fastest seed time in the event, 22.34 seconds.

Hoping to continue Orange County's legacy of Olympic medal-winning performances in swimming, diving and water polo, the Board of Supervisors plans to develop an Olympic training facility at the El Toro Marine base. In a rare unanimous move by the five-member board, which has been deeply divided over plans to build an international airport on the base, supervisors voted to open the base's indoor pool to the Irvine Novaquatics.

It was Paul Carter's first competition in 13 years and it had been 23 years since he was a member of Tennessee's first national championship swim team. But on Saturday at the Speedo Grand Challenge at Heritage Park, the 43-year-old swimmer showed he still has what it takes to compete with some of the best.

If the South Coast Relays last weekend are a sign of things to come, just hand the Southern Section trophies to the boys' and girls' swim teams from Irvine. Each team completed a clean sweep of all 14 events at Saddleback College, and the girls broke three meet records in the process. The squads are both favored to win their respective Division I titles, giving the girls' six in a row and for the boys, back-to-back championships.

It was 15 years ago that Scott Hinman began coaching girls' swimming at Irvine High. Back then, the Vaquero team traveled to the Southern Section finals in a van. "We would only have five or six swimmers make the finals," Hinman said. "And only one of those was a girl." But ever since Olympian Amanda Beard set foot on the Irvine pool decks, things have changed, and now when the Vaqueros head to the finals, a bus is required just for the girls.

Hoping to continue Orange County's legacy of Olympic medal-winning performances in swimming, diving and water polo, the Board of Supervisors plans to develop an Olympic training facility at the El Toro Marine base. In a rare unanimous move by the five-member board, which has been deeply divided over plans to build an international airport on the base, supervisors voted to open the base's indoor pool to the Irvine Novaquatics.

In April, Gabrielle Rose was retired from swimming. She was burnt out, frazzled, the love of her sport gone. Unable to give it her all, Rose compiled a resume and set up job interviews at Silicon Valley dot-coms. She was a new Stanford grad with a degree in American Studies and a new life to start. Five months later, Rose is going to the Olympics instead. The job can wait. Saturday night, Rose, 22, swimming for the Irvine Novaquatics, became the unlikeliest qualifier yet.

Keiko and Kosuke Amano are the personification of the phrase, "Different strokes for different folks." There's 17-year-old Keiko, a top-notch sprinter who took the fast lane to swimming success. Then there's 16-year-old Kosuke, a hard-working distance swimmer who took longer to develop but has begun to shine this year. The sister-brother tandem has competed for the Ventura-based Buenaventura Swim Club and Villanova Prep School in Ojai for three years.

The battle over the former El Toro Marine base has been about a lot of things: airport noise, traffic, safety, political pressure, ballot initiatives. But it's also about those who love to swim. For more than a year, youngsters from the Irvine Novaquatics, a nationally ranked swim club, have waited while their adult leaders negotiated with Orange County to lease an unused pool at the base.

After swimming a dismal 100-meter freestyle during preliminaries on the last day of the Speedo Grand Challenge on Sunday, Jason Lezak wanted to make up for it somehow. He did, and he did it in record fashion. Lezak, a U.S. national team member who swims for the Irvine Novaquatics, won in 50.94 second--more than two seconds faster than his prelim tim--beating the record of former Woodbridge High star and Turkish Olympian Derya Buyukuncu by nearly a second.

At 24 years old, Elli Overton isn't exactly an old-timer. But when she swam the 100-meter backstroke Saturday at the Speedo Grand Challenge, she could feel the new young stars pushing her. Overton, a two-time Australian Olympian and the top qualifier in the event, knew she would be challenged by 13-year-old upstart Dianna MacManus of Blue Fin Swim Team, who holds the U.S. national 11-12 age group record in the 50-meter backstroke.

Top officials at the elite Irvine Novaquatics swim club have experienced nothing but bureaucratic headaches since answering an advertisement offering the use of the indoor pool at the former El Toro Marine Corps Air Station. Tony Gauthier, vice president of the club, said county representatives led the swim club to believe it could be using the pool by July 1999. But they have yet to get wet there. If U.S.

After swimming a dismal 100-meter freestyle during preliminaries on the last day of the Speedo Grand Challenge on Sunday, Jason Lezak wanted to make up for it somehow. He did, and he did it in record fashion. Lezak, a U.S. national team member who swims for the Irvine Novaquatics, won in 50.94 second--more than two seconds faster than his prelim tim--beating the record of former Woodbridge High star and Turkish Olympian Derya Buyukuncu by nearly a second.